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This "toothy follow-up to Datlow's first-rate Blood Is Not Enough" offers "admirably inventive variations on vampirism" (Kirkus Reviews). Featuring stories by Jonathan Carroll, Chelsea Quinn Yarbro, and Robert Silverberg, A Whisper of Blood is a "consistently engrossing anthology" from award-winning editor Ellen Datlow (Publishers Weekly). Continuing to expand the boundaries of the concept of vampirism--as she did in her first collection, Blood Is Not Enough--Datlow has assembled eighteen show more fascinating stories that range from tales of literal vampires to what she calls "metaphorical bloodsuckers," who can drain another's life force without ever sinking their teeth into necks. In "Now I Lay Me Down to Sleep" by Suzy McKee Charnas, an elderly Jewish woman who's taken her own life has second thoughts and makes a deal to become a vampire to stay immortal, the only condition being she has to drink blood by request only. An amnesiac operative tries to sort out if a secret government agency is trying to help him regain his memory or is wiping it clean in Chelsea Quinn Yarbro's Kafkaesque "Do I Dare to Eat a Peach?" And in Jonathan Carroll's "The Moose Church," a tourist in Sardinia is literally scarred by asking questions of death in his dreams . . . A Whisper of Blood includes contributions by Suzy McKee Charnas, Karl Edward Wagner, Robert Silverberg, Kathe Koja, Elizabeth Massie, Barry N. Malzberg, Rick Wilber, Jonathan Carroll, Thomas Ligotti, Melissa Mia Hall, David J. Schow, Jack Womack, Melinda M. Snodgrass, Thomas Tessier, Chelsea Quinn Yarbro, K. W. Jeter, Pat Cadigan, and Robert Holdstock and Garry Kilworth. show lessTags
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This is a hard one because overall most of these stories were entertaining and well-written. Yet many missed the point entirely or I am being too strict in what I consider a modern vampire story. I tend to think it is the former. Many of the stories really pushed the boundary of what it means to be a modern vampire story and not in a good way. In a 'this really has nothing to do with vampires in any way, shape or form unless one redefines the notion of vampire to have nothing to do with the concept of a vampire in a context in which vampires are recognizable' sort of way. Yeah. Seriously, that mangled sentence is the mental gymnastics one must go through to find vampires in some of these stories.
A vampire does not have to suck blood to show more be a vampire. Most vampire fans also do not demand a strict adherence to vampire canon in order to find worth and entertainment in a vampire story. But on some level, the vampirism cannot be so postmodern in its interpretation of vampires that an audience has to analyze the story to the point of banality to find the vampiric element and too many stories in this collection demanded that sort of analysis.
Read the rest of the review here: http://ireadeverything.com/?p=119 show less
A vampire does not have to suck blood to show more be a vampire. Most vampire fans also do not demand a strict adherence to vampire canon in order to find worth and entertainment in a vampire story. But on some level, the vampirism cannot be so postmodern in its interpretation of vampires that an audience has to analyze the story to the point of banality to find the vampiric element and too many stories in this collection demanded that sort of analysis.
Read the rest of the review here: http://ireadeverything.com/?p=119 show less
More short stories (eighteen of them, to be precise) with a vampiric theme, compiled by the same editor who put together BLOOD IS NOT ENOUGH. Submissions by Jonathan Carroll, Suzy McKee Charnas, Davis J. Schow, Robert Silverberg, Chelsea Quinn Yarbro, and others. Good stuff.
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Ellen Datlow is the editor of science fiction, fantasy, and horror anthologies. She was the fiction editor of Omni magazine and Omni Online from 1981-1998. Then she was the editor of the webzine Event Horizon: Science Fiction, Fantasy, and Horror from September 1998-December 1999. She has won the World Fantasy Award seven times, the Bram Stoker show more Award twice with her co-editors and the Hugo Award for Best Editor in 2002 and 2005. She currently lives in New York City and edits fiction for Scifi.com. In 2011 she was given the Life Achievement Award by the Horror Writers Association.She is a long time trustee of the Horror Writers Association. She has been the co-host of the Fantastic Fiction reading series at the KGB Bar since 2000, a series which features luminaries and up-and-comers in speculative fiction. (Bowker Author Biography) show less
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Common Knowledge
- Original title
- A whisper of blood
- Alternate titles*
- Levolle lasken Luojani; Now I lay me down to sleep; Etana; Slug; Lämpöinen mies; Warm man (show all 36); Epämuodostumia; Teratisms; Äiti; M is for the many things; Kolmen kauppa; Folly for three; Rakastunut seivästäjä; The impaler in love; Pyhän hirven kirkko; The moose church; Rouva Rinaldin enkeli; Mrs. Rinaldi's angel; Allasväkeä; The pool people; Viikko epäelämää; A week in the unlife; Elämänveri; Lifeblood; Kuolinmessu; Requiem; Vääräuskoinen; Infidel; Uskallanko syödä persikan?; Do I dare to eat a peach?; Tosi rakkautta; True love; Koti meren rannalla; Home by the sea; Räsypuu; The ragthorn
- Original publication date
- 1991
- Original language
- English
- Canonical DDC/MDS
- 813.087381
*Some information comes from Common Knowledge in other languages. Click "Edit" for more information.
Classifications
- Genres
- Fiction and Literature, Horror, Fantasy
- DDC/MDS
- 813.087381 — Literature & rhetoric American literature in English American fiction in English By type Genre fiction Adventure fiction Horror fiction; Ghost fiction Horror fiction Vampires and the undead
- LCC
- PS648 .V35 .W47 — Language and Literature American literature American literature Collections of American literature Prose (General)
- BISAC
Statistics
- Members
- 284
- Popularity
- 113,038
- Reviews
- 2
- Rating
- (3.16)
- Languages
- English, Finnish
- Media
- Paper, Ebook
- ISBNs
- 7
- ASINs
- 3
